The Search Episode 3: Right Foot Forward
There are levels of surfing perfection. At the highest level everything comes together.
1. Wind.
2. Tide.
3. Swell and
4. Crowd – or more importantly a lack thereof…
You can have the first three factors just right and you’re stoked, but if the fourth and final is on overload then you’re on the frustrating lowest of low levels. You’d rather it be less than perfect and uncrowded than the stuff dreams are made of and never get a chance to actually ride a wave, right?
Comments
Poor buggers. Had to go on a all expenses paid surf trip and then share waves with a bunch of hacks, who you burn anyway........life is very fucking unfair!
Yeah, and then go an blow a not so crowded spot by putting it all over the Internet. That vid did nothing for me except make me angry.
True a simple vid like this could easily see a low key wave become crowded, I'm glad its not a spot or area i surf, i call bullshit on the vid anyway its much more likely their photographer or guide whatever said hey lets go to this other spot away from the crowd to get some footage rather than we turned our backs on good waves and went searching down ever dirt road until we found this.
Definitely agree. It's the photographer who has his/her job on the line if they don't score waves, and most of the time it is the photographer who organises the whole trip in Indo these days.
It's completely, utterly tragic how quickly people will sell out a spot (let alone a sport) for their own personal financial gain. I don't surf the area either, but the principle is the same: if you work in the surf industry and travel to quiet spots and expose them to the world for a few photos and some faux-surf-feral cred, I hope you never catch a wave ever again.
sick little wave
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Come to think of it Slater shouldn't have bothered making a wave pool, he should have worked on a time machine instead. You'd only have to travel back 20 odd years to be the only person surfing Shipsterns or Jaws, 30 years for Teahupoo, 40 years for G land and just over 50 years to be the first guy to paddle out at Pipeline.
Ps was the horribly crowded wave in the vid Supersuck?
Scoop, their def talking about Supersuck, every year it gets more crowded, 80 a day on it this year when it was going. I think this was taped back in August as Im pretty sure I ran into these guys at some point, I could be wrong though. Plenty of other waves around if your willing to look and explore
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Come on Rip Curl, sort your shit out.
Still blowing out surf spots so you can sell boardies ?
Gay as fuck.
What is a "progressive wave"?? Maybe that's were I'm going wrong, not surfing enough progressive waves......
people that's 'the people' as in the normal people should start our own campaign...'The Shame' and graffiti any 'The Search' poster that's in reach by writing 'The Shame' over the top of it. maybe then ripcurl will realise they're crushing the dreams of average surfers across the globe.
I have one such poster in mind I'm gonna hit up as soon as I get home
I like it...
You could get GC point breaks 8' and to yourself in the 90's if you were lucky. No skis.
Thank your mother for the rabbits and fuck off to every southerner who ever moved north.
Typical negative Internet hero comments. They haven't named the spot so what's the problem? I like seeing video of new locations. It would be pretty boring if the only surf videos were of snapper or pipeline.
They didn't name " La Jolla " either.
I'll happily wear that label, because for the most part I am completely against this kind of caper. Others have offered criticism, and it's something that the surf brands could take on board if they gave a shit about anything but money (answer: they don't). As Indo has said below, they could easily disguise the whole thing and still give clueless barnacles a sense of adventure. Your viewing pleasure would in no way be diminished by such tactics. But the people who have been quietly surfing these waves and staying with locals in these villages for decades most certainly lose out.
In any case, it's completely bonkers to argue that there is no problem with such videos. Naming the wave is not the only way spots are exposed and I could point to scores of once-unknown waves that are now crowded and bring very little benefit of all to local communities. The only ones that win are expatriate tourism operators, the surf media, the surf brands and, to steal your term, the heroes who feel that feel bigger by exposing spots.
The problem here is not so much the waves shown, but all the clues that lead up to it.
1. You are first shown the crowded wave with obvious clues of the spot by wave shape, known crowded wave, land marks, hence letting you know not only the wave but the area they are in giving you a starting point and conditions to go looking in.
2. You are then shown how you can access the spot, just drive right up on a dirt road, latter confirmed with a shot from the road looking towards the break.
3. You are then shown various geographic shots from all kinds of angles giving you a very good idea of the location, even the view from the road, hence even in less than ideal conditions you would know where this wave was if you went to the area..
Its all done like this to make it seem like an adventure to make it interesting and give credibility to a surf brand, that they are more than just a big company making products for surfing to make money.
However this is all at the expense of exposing and crowding of a spot, these things can actually be done tastefully without giving things away.
For example.
1. They could have just shown a crowded Bali line up and said we had to go search for uncrowded waves, giving you a starting point with no indication to the final destination.
2. Then they could have shown land shots that could be anywhere in Indo, then maybe some boat shots giving the idea they have found a spot not accessible by land, hence cutting out the number of people who will go looking for this wave or go shit i know that bay, i didn't know it got that good, we will have to go there when there is more swell etc.
3. They then could have either given misleading land shots and not shown land marks with the wave in the picture.
It might all seem paranoid but if this was a spot that you often go too and its low key and next year you turned up and it was crowded, then the following year a guy builds a surf camp in front of it, I'm sure you would be pissed off.